5) The legless condition that is observed in several groups of extant
reptiles is the result of ________.
A) their common ancestor
having been legless
B) a shared adaptation to an arboreal (living
in trees) lifestyle
C) several instances of the legless condition arising
independently of each other
D) individual lizards adapting to a
fossorial (living in burrows) lifestyle during their lifetimes
C
6) The various taxonomic levels (for example, phyla, genera, classes)
of the hierarchical classification system differ from each other on
the basis of ________.
A) how widely the organisms assigned to
each are distributed throughout the environment
B) their inclusiveness
C) the relative genome sizes of the organisms assigned to each
D) morphological characters that are applicable to all organisms
B
7) If organisms A, B, and C belong to the same class but to different
orders and if organisms C, D, and E belong to the same order but to
different families, which of the following pairs of organisms would be
expected to show the greatest degree of structural homology?
A) A
and D
B) B and D
C) B and C
D) D and E
D
8) Carolus Linnaeus believed that species remained fixed in the form
in which they had been created. Linnaeus would have been uncomfortable
with ________.
A) a hierarchical classification scheme
B) taxonomy
C) phylogenies
D) nested, increasingly inclusive categories
of organisms
C
9) The best classification system is that which most closely ________.
A) unites organisms that possess similar morphologies
B)
conforms to traditional, Linnaean taxonomic practices
C) reflects
evolutionary history
D) reflects the basic separation of prokaryotes from eukaryotes
C
12) Some beetles and flies have antler-like structures on their
heads, much like male deer. The existence of antlers in beetle, fly,
and deer species with strong male-male competition is an example of
________.
A) convergent evolution
B) similarity due to shared ancestry
C) homology
D) parsimony
A
13) The term convergent evolution is most applicable to which of the following features?
A) the legless condition found in various lineages of extant
lizards
B) the five-digit condition of human hands and bat
wings
C) the fur that covers Australian moles and North American moles
D) the bones of bat forelimbs and the bones of bird forelimbs
A
14) If, someday, an archaean cell is discovered whose rRNA sequence
is more similar to that of humans than the sequence of mouse rRNA is
to that of humans, the best explanation for this apparent discrepancy
would be ________.
A) homology
B) convergent evolution
C) common ancestry
D)
retro-evolution by humans
B
15) Which of the following pairs are the best examples of homologous
structures? A) eyelessness in the Australian mole and eyelessness in
the North American mole B) owl wing and hornet wing
C) bat wing
and bird wing
D) bones in the bat wing and bones in the human forelimb
D
16) Some molecular data place the giant panda in the bear family (Ursidae) but place the lesser panda in the raccoon family (Procyonidae). If the molecular data best reflect the evolutionary history of these two groups, then the morphological similarities of these two species is most likely due to ________.
A) the inheritance of acquired characteristics B) sexual
selection
C) possession of analogous (convergent) traits D)
possession of shared primitive characters
C
17) The importance of computers and of computer software to modern
systematics s is most closely linked to advances in ________.
A)
light microscopy
B) radiometric dating
C) fossil discovery techniques
D) molecular genetics
D
18) The common ancestors of birds and mammals were very early (stem) reptiles, which almost certainly possessed three-chambered hearts (two atria, one ventricle). Birds and mammals, however, are alike in having four-chambered hearts (two atria, two ventricles). The four- chambered hearts of birds and mammals are best described as ________.
A) structural homologies
B) vestiges
C) structural
analogies
D) the result of shared ancestry
C
19) Imagine that a phylogeny was developed for a group of mammals based on bone structure. Which of the following statements would be a reasonable prediction about a phylogeny for the same group of species based on similarities and differences in the structure of a particular enzyme?
A) The same phylogeny would be unlikely.
B) The same phylogeny
would be predicted.
C) No prediction could be made.
D) The
amino acid sequence would be identical in all species.
A
25) Which of the following would be most useful in creating a phylogenetic tree of a taxon?
A) morphological data from fossil and living species
B) a
knowledge of color patterns in fossil and living species
C) a
knowledge of mutation rates in modern species
D) morphological data from fossil species
D
26) Your professor wants you to construct a phylogenetic tree of orchids. She gives you tissue from seven orchid species and one lily. What is the most likely reason she gave you the lily?
A) to serve as an outgroup
B) to see if the lily is a cryptic
orchid species
C) to see if the lily and the orchids show all the same shared derived characters D) to demonstrate likely homoplasies
A
27) Which of the following statements best describes the rationale
for applying the principle of maximum parsimony in constructing
phylogenetic trees?
A) Parsimony allows the researcher to
"root" the tree.
B) Similarity due to common ancestry
should be more common than similarity due to convergent evolution.
C) The molecular clock validates the principle of
parsimony.
D) The outgroup roots the tree, allowing the
principle of parsimony to be applied.
B
29) Which of the following statements is accurate with regard to a
phylogeny, as represented by a phylogenetic tree?
A) Descendant
groups (branches) from the same node likely share many derived
characters.
B) A monophyletic group can be properly based on
convergent features.
C) The ancestral group often has all the derived characters of the descendant species. D) Shared ancestral characters are excellent traits to use in developing a phylogeny.
A
31) Which of the following is (are) problematic when the goal is to
construct phylogenies that accurately reflect evolutionary
history?
A) polyphyletic taxa
B) paraphyletic taxa
C) monophyletic taxa
D) polyphyletic taxa and paraphyletic taxa
D
33) There is some evidence that reptiles called cynodonts may have
had whisker-like hairs around their mouths. If true, then hair is a
shared ________.
A) derived character of mammals, even if
cynodonts continue to be classified as reptiles
B) derived character of all vertebrates and not of the mammal clade
C) ancestral character of the all vertebrates, but only if cynodonts are reclassified as mammals
D) derived character of mammals, but only if cynodonts are reclassified as mammals
D
40) In a comparison of birds and mammals, having four limbs is
________. A) a shared ancestral character
B) a shared derived
character
C) a character useful for distinguishing birds from mammals
D) an example of analogy rather than homology
A
41) To apply the principle of maximum parsimony to construction of a
phylogenetic tree, ________.
A) choose the tree that assumes all
evolutionary changes are equally probable
B) choose the tree in
which the branch points are based on as many shared derived characters
as possible
C) choose the tree that represents the fewest evolutionary
changes, either in DNA sequences or morphology
D) choose the
tree with the fewest branch points
C
42) If you were using cladistics to build a phylogenetic tree of
cats, which of the following would be the best outgroup?
A)
lion
B) domestic cat
C) wolf
D) leopard
C
44) Concerning growth in genome size over evolutionary time, which of
these is least associated with the others?
A) orthologous
genes
B) gene duplications
C) paralogous genes
D) gene families
A
45) Eukaryotes that are not closely related and that do not share
many anatomical similarities can still be placed together on the same
phylogenetic tree by comparing their ________.
A)
plasmids
B) mitochondrial genomes
C) homologous genes that are poorly conserved
D) homologous genes that are highly conserved
D
46) A phylogenetic tree constructed using sequence differences in
mitochondrial DNA would be most valid for discerning the evolutionary
relatedness of ________.
A) archaeans and bacteria
B) fungi
and animals
C) chimpanzees and humans
D) sharks and dolphins
C
47) The lakes of northern Minnesota are home to many similar species of damselflies of the genus Enallagma. These species have apparently undergone speciation from ancestral stock since the last glacial retreat about 10 thousand years ago. Sequencing which of the following would probably be most useful in sorting out evolutionary relationships among these closely related species?
A) conserved regions of nuclear DNA
B) mitochondrial DNA
C) amino acids in proteins
D)
ribosomal RNA
B
48) Which statement represents the best explanation for the
observation that the nuclear DNA of wolves and domestic dogs has a
very high degree of sequence homology? Dogs and wolves
________.
A) have very similar morphologies
B) belong to the same order
C) are both members of the order
Carnivora
D) share a very recent common ancestor
D
49) The reason that paralogous genes can diverge from each other
within the same gene pool, whereas orthologous genes diverge only
after gene pools are isolated from each other, is that
________.
A) having multiple copies of genes is essential for the
occurrence of sympatric speciation in the wild
B) paralogous genes can occur only in diploid species, thus they
are absent from most prokaryotes
C) polyploidy is a necessary
precondition for the occurrence of sympatric speciation in the wild
D) having an extra copy of a gene permits modifications to the copy without loss of the original gene product
D
51) The most important feature that permits a gene to act as a molecular clock is ________.
A) a large number of base pairs
B) being acted upon by
natural selection
C) a reliable average rate of mutation
D) a recent origin by a gene-duplication event
C
52) Molecular clocks are more reliable when ________.
A) the
surrounding pH is close to 7.0
B) most mutations of highly
conserved DNA sequences should have no functional effect
C) the
DNA codes for amino acid sequences whose side groups (or R groups)
have a neutral pH
D) a significant proportion of mutations are not acted upon by natural selection
D
53) Which of the following would, if it had acted upon a gene,
prevent this gene from acting as a reliable molecular clock?
A)
neutral mutations
B) genetic drift
C) mutations within introns
D) natural selection
D
55) Based on cladistics, which eukaryotic kingdom is polyphyletic and, therefore, unacceptable?
A) Plantae
B) Fungi
C) Animalia
D) Protista
D
56) Which eukaryotic kingdom includes members that are the result of
endosymbioses that included an ancient aerobic bacterium and an
ancient cyanobacterium?
A) Plantae
B) Fungi
C) Animalia
D) Protista
A
57) A large proportion of archaeans are extremophiles, so called because they inhabit extreme environments with high acidity, salinity, and/or temperature. Such environments are thought to have been much more common on primitive Earth. Thus, modern extremophiles survive only in places that their ancestors became adapted to long ago. Which of the following is, consequently, a valid statement about modern extremophiles, assuming that their habitats have remained relatively unchanged?
A) Among themselves, they should share relatively few ancestral
traits, especially those that enabled ancestral forms to adapt to
extreme conditions.
B) On a phylogenetic tree whose branch
lengths are proportional to the amount of genetic change, the branches
of the extremophiles should be shorter than the non-extremophilic archaeans.
C) They should contain genes that originated in eukaryotes that
are the hosts for numerous species of bacteria.
D) They should
currently be undergoing a high level of horizontal gene transfer with
non- extremophilic archaeans.
B
58) Use the following information to answer the question.
Paulinella chromatophora is one of the few cercozoans that is autotrophic, carrying out aerobic photosynthesis with its two elongated "chromatophores." The chromatophores are contained within vesicles of the host cell, and each is derived from a cyanobacterium, though not the same type of cyanobacterium that gave rise to the chloroplasts of algae and plants.
A crucial photosynthetic gene of the cyanobacterium that gave rise
to the chromatophore is called psaE. This gene is present in the
nuclear genome of the cercozoan, but is not in the genome of the
chromatophore. This is evidence of ________.
A) reciprocal
mutations in the chromatophore and nuclear genomes
B) horizontal gene transfer from bacterium to eukaryotes
C)
genetic recombination involving a protist and an archaean
D)
transduction by a phage that infects both prokaryotes and eukaryotes
B
59) What kind of evidence has recently made it necessary to assign
the prokaryotes to either of two different domains, rather than
assigning all prokaryotes to the same kingdom?
A) mtDNA
B)
rRNA genes
C) morphological
D) ecological
B
63) Which of the following statements is accurate, at least according to our present knowledge?
A) Eukaryotes acquired nuclear genes only in the distant past;
these genes can allow survival in anaerobic environments.
B)
Genes from prokaryotes have been acquired by some eukaryotes; these
genes can allow survival in extreme environments.
C) Prokaryotes acquired genes from eukaryotes many times; these
genes can allow survival in extreme environments.
D) Prokaryotes
acquired genes from fungi; these genes can allow the digestion of cellulose.
B
65) If additional DNA sequence evidence shows that yeast genes for
synthesizing proteins are more similar to protein-synthesizing genes
in bacteria than those in archaea, a modern systematist would
________.
A) redraw the phylogeny to show eukaryotes sharing a
more recent common ancestor with bacteria than archaea
B) redraw the phylogeny to show more recent common ancestry
between archaea and yeast than between eukaryotes and archaea
C)
retain the phylogeny that shows a more recent common ancestor between
eukaryotes and archaea
D) retain the phylogeny that shows a more recent common ancestor between bacteria and archaea
A
66) Which of the following statements about horizontal gene transfer
is accurate?
A) Horizontal gene transfer was quite common in the
early stages of evolution of life on Earth.
B) Horizontal gene transfer among organisms does not occur
today.
C) Horizontal gene transfer moves only genes that play a
role in metabolism.
D) Horizontal gene transfer occurs only among
closely related organisms.
A
67) The kingdom Monera was dismantled because of which of the
following reasons? A) Some Monera contained nuclei in their
cells.
B) The Monera, as originally constituted, contained both
plants and animals.
C) The Monera, as originally constituted, was monophyletic.
D) Some, but not all, of the organisms in Monera contained DNA sequences that were similar to those of eukaryotes.
D
68) Imagine that you discovered the following information:
Feature
RNA polymerase
Introns
Antibiotic sensitivity
Membrane Lipids
Bacteria
small, simple
absent
sensitive
C
chains unbranched
Archaea
complex
present insensitive
C chains branched
Eukaryotes complex
present insensitive
C chains branched
These data would support which of the following
conclusions?
A) Eukaryotes share a more recent common ancestor
with bacteria than with archaea. B) Bacteria are the only one of the
three groups that lacks a nucleus.
C) Archaea are more similar
to bacteria than to eukaryotes.
D) Eukaryotes are more similar
to archaea than to bacteria.
D